with their every
affection devoted to its perishable vanities, inhale all the
delights of enthusiasm, as they sit in crowded assemblage, around
the deep and solemn oratorio." "It is a very possible thing, that
the moral and the rational and the active man, may have given no
entrance into his bosom for any of the sentiments, and yet so
overpowered may he be by the charm of vocal conveyance through which
they are addressed to him, that he may be made to feel with such an
emotion, and to weep with such a tenderness, and to kindle with such
a transport, and to glow with such an elevation, as may one and all
carry upon them the semblance of sacredness."--_Chalmers' Works,
Phila., 1830, p. 107-8._

In speaking of the connection between music and worship, another
person, not a member of the Society of Friends, observes: "I firmly
believe" "that if we seek to affect the mind by the aid of
architecture, painting or music, the impression produced by these
adjuncts is just so much subtracted from the worship of the unseen
Jehovah. If the outward eye is taken up with material splendor, or
forms of external beauty, the mind sees but little of Him who is
invisible; the ear that is entranced with the melody of sweet
sounds, listens not to the still small voice by which the Lord makes
his presence known."

"True spiritual access unto God," says another writer, "is not at
all furthered by the excitement of the animal or intellectual frame.
It is most commonly known, where in abstraction from outward things,
the mind, in awful quietude, finds itself gathered into a sense of
the presence of Infinite Purity."

"By the power of imagination; by the influence of eloquent words; by
a stirring swell of elevated music, the mind may be excited; the
feelings may be tendered, and we may pour forth verbal supplication,
whilst the heart is unchanged."

Edward Burrough thus instructively describes the changes which
followed the declension of the primitive church from its original
state of life and purity.

"When the gift of the ministry through the Holy Ghost was lost and
no more received, men began to make ministers by learning arts and
languages and human policy. They began to study from books and
writings what to preach, not having the Holy Ghost, without which
none are the ministers of Christ." "Having